§ Mr. ClappisonTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what assessment has been made of the average indebtedness of students upon graduation in each of the last 10 years. [137475]
§ Alan JohnsonThe table shows the average student loan debt at the point at which they entered repayment status for borrowers who became liable to repay their loans in financial years 1999–2000 to 2002–03. Data for earlier years are not available.
Average student loan debt on entering year entered repayment status1 £ Financial year entered repayment status2 Mortgage style loans3 Income contingent loans4 Part-time loans5 1999–2000 3,530 6— 6— 2000–01 4.090 2,300 6— 2001–02 4,490 3,410 450 2002–03 5,150 5,980 520 1 Data rounded to nearest £10. Includes interest accrued up to the point of entering repayment status. Excludes any early voluntary repayments which may have been made before borrowers enter repayment status. Debt of borrowers with more than one loan type has been split between types. 2 Borrowers enter repayment status in the April following their graduation or otherwise leaving their course. Borrowers may have accounts in more than one cohort year of entering repayment. 3 Loans made to students who entered higher education up to 1997–98 or who entered in 1998–99 under existing arrangements. Includes loans repayable to the private sector following the sale of two trenches of student loans. 4 Loans, repayable on an income contingent basis, available to students who entered higher education from academic year 1998–99. These loans were subject to a repayment holiday until April 2000. Includes hardship loans. 5 Fixed-rate loans made to eligible part-time students, introduced in September 2000. 6 Not applicable. Source
Student Loans Company
The first cohort of students on a three-year degree course who entered higher education under the new student support arrangements became liable for repayment in April 2002. That, and earlier, cohorts includes a disproportionate number of students on shorter courses as well as those who have left higher education before completing their courses. Therefore the average level of debt will not be representative of the average debt experienced by those who complete their courses.
Borrowers are liable to repay their loans from the April following graduation or otherwise leaving their course. Students who started their course from the 1998–99 academic year will repay income contingent loans. Loans for those who started their course before 1998–99 are repayable on a mortgage style basis.
The Department does not have annual data for HE students' total debt on graduation (including bank loans, overdrafts, credit cards, and informal debts to family and friends). The Student income and Expenditure Survey (SIES), which collects this information is undertaken every three to four years. Findings from the last survey in 1998–99 showed that the average total anticipated debt of all full-time 556W students graduating in 1998–99 was £3,462. The Department has conducted a SIES for the 2002–03 academic year which will be published shortly.